India to construct $566m multi-purpose dam on Yamuna river

The Government of India has inked a memorandum of understanding (MoU) with six stakeholder state governments to construct Lakhwar-Vyasi multi-purpose project in the Upper Yamuna basin in Uttarakhand with an investment of Rs40bn ($566.36m).

The MoU was signed by chief ministers of Uttar Pradesh, Rajasthan, Uttarakhand, Haryana, Delhi and Himachal Pradesh.

The project is aimed at addressing the irrigation and power needs of the six partner states.

As per the plan, a 204m high concrete dam will be constructed across the Yamuna river near Lohari village in Dehradun district of Uttarakhand.

The dam will have a live storage capacity of 330.66 million cubic metres (MCM).

The project is expected to provide irrigation to 33,780 hectares of land while 78.83 MCM water will be made available for domestic, drinking and industrial use in the six states.

Uttarakhand government will bear Rs13.88bn ($197m) of the total cost.

The central government will contribute Rs23.2bn ($329m) out of the remaining Rs25.78bn ($366m), which is part of the irrigation and drinking water components.

Storage created by Lakhwar project will be shared by the basin states in proportion to their overall annual allocations as mentioned in the original MoU, which was inked between the six states in May 1994.

The project was approved by the Planning Commission In 1976 and the construction began in 1987, however the work was stopped in 1992 due to lack of funds. By then, almost 30% of the work was completed.

Uttarakhand Jal Vidyut Nigam Limited (UJVL) will execute the project.

Newsletter

For all the latest pharmaceutical industry news, sign up for our regular updates.